


The Blood That Runs Through Our Veins

by wtf_liv



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Ending, Depression, Hurt Steve Rogers, M/M, PTSD, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Steve Needs a Hug, Steve Rogers Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2017-07-27
Packaged: 2018-12-07 13:56:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11624952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wtf_liv/pseuds/wtf_liv
Summary: What if Bucky never remembered who he was? What if Bucky never pulled Steve from the Potomac?What if Steve didn't want him to?This is a short ficlet centered around Steve's estrangement from his surroundings when he enters the 21st century and how sometimes there just isn't anything left to save.PLEASE HEAD THE TAGS!!! MAJOR CHARACTER DEATH!!





	The Blood That Runs Through Our Veins

It wasn't that Steve was necessarily unhappy in the 21st century. It was just that…

Steve had died.

Death was final. There was no returning from death. Once you hit game over you can't hit ‘Save Progress’ and start where you had left off again. Nothing could begin after death. That's what Steve had thought.

But when he was being thawed, he woke up briefly. He woke up just enough to recognize that he was, in fact, awake. You don't wake up after you die.

Steve had not died.

The apartment they gave him was large; it was too big and too modern and too not ‘Steve Rogers’. ( _“They” being SHIELD, an organization in which Steve didn't know if he trusted yet_.) Steve kept glancing out the window and expecting to see a fire escape, but instead saw downtown D.C. At night he would walk into the bathroom to rinse himself off over the basin only to find himself staring at a shower with too many knobs and handles for him to understand. In the morning he awoke expecting to hear the whistling of bombs dropping nearby, but all he heard was the sound of cars on the street.

No one had explained it to Steve. No one had explained anything to Steve. He was completely alone in a world full of technology that he never asked for.

But then he wasn't alone. Nick Fury, the head of SHIELD and the same man that surrounded him in the streets of New York City the day he woke up ( _why did he wake up_ ), came to him in his gym. He had a mission for Captain America. Steve Rogers may have been lost, but Captain America always knew what to do in battle. And so Steve found himself on a flying, invisible boat with people he had just met.

He met Natasha. He liked her. He couldn't tell if she liked him. ( _He hoped she did_ ).

He met Bruce. Bruce was calm and nervous and Steve felt about the same way. They were both oddities in a strange world.

He met Tony. ( _He was so much like Howard. God, Steve missed Howard. He missed Peggy. He missed B- He didn't have time to miss anyone._ )

He met Thor. Thor was probably the one who Steve could relate to the most. Neither one of them were from this world.

Lastly, he met Clint once he was rescued from Loki. He liked Clint because he had the same sense of humor as-  
He liked Clint.

These people were supposed to be his new team. Steve tried to match them with the personality traits of the Howlies in his mind, but he couldn't find any similarities. These people knew nothing about him and he knew nothing about them. And yet they fought together. They killed together. They won together.

Steve felt needed again. Until he wasn't needed anymore.

Steve found himself forming a monotone routine that involved waking up too early ( _why does he always wake up_ ) going for a run, eating, and going to sleep too early. He didn't interact with anyone outside of the grocery store clerk. He didn't want to talk to anyone. No one knew who he was. No one understood why he could only force himself to eat the bare minimum of what his body should have due to the years of living on rations. No one knew just exactly why he kept blankets in every room no matter the season ( _he just doesn't want to be cold anymore_ ). Life as Steve had once known it had changed so inexplicably beyond repair that, in return, Steve crossed the threshold of who he once was and let that skinny, little boy with a crooked smile die. At least part of him got to die.

Except he hadn't died.

Because all of a sudden Steve was on the run from SHIELD ( _Hydra?? SHIELD?? He didn't know anymore_ ) and he was with Natasha, who had so many secrets she rivaled Steve in that category. Sam helped him ( _really, he helped him so much_ ) and Natasha as much as he could, but how could Steve drag another person into his mess? How could he live with the fact that Sam and Natasha, two indisviduals who he barely knew, who he had no past with, were willing to risk their lives helping him? He could barely live with the weight of his own atonements, let alone the anchors of others'.

But that boy from Brooklyn, too dumb to back away from a fight, dragged him self on as he was antagonized by yet another bully. He dragged himself to his old base camp. He dragged himself out of the rubble of the camp, Natasha over his arm. He dragged him self all the way to the streets of a city he didn't know ( _though, he really didn't know any cities anymore so what's really the difference?_ ) before finally stopping. And finally, that skinny, little boy felt alive as he faced Bucky ( _Bucky?_ ) and he was clawing inside of Captain America to escape and finally let the world know why Steve Rogers had ever been alive in the first place when everything really fell apart.

Bucky didn't remember him.

Bucky didn't remember...Bucky.

So as Steve muttered into his com on a helicarrier that there was finally a “Charlie Lock” he didn't hesitate in also telling Maria Hill to start firing the guns.

Steve Rogers had lived for a very long time. Not one second of his time on Earth was he not thinking of Bucky. Even when otherwise occupied, Bucky made up the essential elements and compounds that composed him. He ran through Steve’s veins, thicker than blood, pumping through his entire body, from his toes to his brain, finally meeting back at the one place he could always call home: his heart.

And so as Bucky ( _Bucky please...please just recognize him_ ) beat him within an inch of his life, Steve Rogers, Captain America, whoever he was in that moment, let him. With every punch, with every blank stare, he felt his blood draining from his body. He felt Bucky draining from his heart. ( _I'm with you to the end of the line, pal._ )

It’s not that Steve was unhappy in the 21st century.   
It's that Steve was never happy to begin with.

He fell, slamming into the water ( _Oh God, it's so familiar_ ) and instead of swimming, or paddling, or doing goddamn anything, Steve Rogers sank. There was no Bucky to save him.

He died.

This time, he didn't wake up. ( _Finally_.)

**Author's Note:**

> Gosh, my second fic on here and a second Major Character Death. 2/2 on that aren't I?
> 
> Once again I'm sorry for any angst/grief/sadness caused!! 
> 
>  
> 
> Feel free to comment, leave a kudos, and check out my other fic!
> 
> Thank you for reading!!!


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